The People's Daily (June 21) published an interesting article by Bao Xinjian, Professor at the School of Marxism, Shandong University, captioned 'Demonstrate the most distinctive character and greatest advantage of self-revolution (a monograph celebrating the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China)'. Asserting that: “we must continue to promote the Party’s great self-revolution, to ensure that the Party always maintains flesh-and-blood ties with the people, and build the most reliable class foundation and mass foundation for the Party’s long-term rule”, Bao Xinjian sends "a message to the cadre about what is expected and warning against becoming too comfortable and lethargic assuming continued power. This is the Party telling its members that performance legitimacy matters, and not failure to address public concerns and becoming aloof elite have serious political consequences." He says that “Socialism with Chinese characteristics has entered a new era, and the main social contradictions in China have transformed. The people's yearning for a better life has become stronger. They are looking forward to better education, more stable jobs, more satisfactory income, more reliable social security, higher-level medical and health services, more comfortable living conditions, more beautiful environment, and richer spiritual and cultural life. They also want their children growing up better, working better and living better. The people’s yearning for a better life is our goal.” Bao Xinjian then warns that as a Party rules for a long period of time, “various factors that weaken the party's advancement and damage the party’s purity are always present, various dangers that go against the original intention and mission and shake the party’s foundation are everywhere, the issues of ideological impurity, political impurity, organisational impurity, stylistic impurity and other outstanding problems have not been fundamentally resolved. The ‘four major tests’ and ‘four dangers’ that the Party faces are long-term and acute issues, and factors that affect the Party’s advancement and weaken its purity are also complex. The longer you are in power, the more you can't lose the true nature of a Marxist political party, the more you can't forget the original mission of the party, and the more you can’t lose your self-revolutionary spirit.”
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